Full AC from 1.1-3.2. This document was graded 96% and helped me achieve an A* last year. All AC’s are in depth with everything needed for top mark band.
AC1.1 Evaluating the effectiveness of the roles of personnel involved in criminal
investigations
National crime agency
The national crime agency (NCA) was set up in 2013 as the UK’s leading crime fighting
agency. Their role in criminal investigations can vary depending on the crime, the NCA was
set up in 2013 to replace the serious organised crime agency as well as merging with the
child exploitation and online protection centre. The NCA can and has worked closely with
other law enforcement agencies and organisations to help investigate and prevent crime
both on a high and low scale.
Strengths
The NCA can be asked to investigate any type of crime, this includes serious and high stake
crime all the way down to petty crime. This can be extremely helpful to the under-funded
investigative personnel such as the police, The NCA’s annual budget is currently £458.8m.
The NCA also makes use of national and international databases to help tackle crime, this
means it can also operate internationally to stop larger scale crimes. The NCA’s international
presence stops crime from coming into the UK but can also help catch criminals in other
European countries as all EU arrest warrants pass through the NCA.
Limitations
Despite their seemingly large workforce (over 4100 overall,), the NCA are prone, like all
government agencies, to cuts. The NCA has a high running cost, the latest budget cut
(50%,) saw a large offload in staff within the NCA, limiting their availability. This can also
have a negative effect on the country's safety, the NCA’s international standing makes them
a target to terrorists and a shortage of staff could lead to officers being spread too thin
leaving the country vulnerable. The Database that the NCA operates off of is often slow and
is prone to crashes, especially so when third party personnel such as solicitors and other
professionals try to input data into the system. Delays on the system can alert criminals that
they are being monitored, harming the potential case against them. Being a government
agency puts the NCA in the limelight, any mistakes made by the NCA will be highlighted and
twisted in the press and so, they have to follow the exact wording of the law to the letter in
order to, not only avoid public ridicule, but to also prevent a case from being dismissed due
to their conduct.
Case study: Judges criticism on the NCA over a collapsed fraud trial
The NCA were investigating a fraud case that saw the deception of many multi-million pound
companies such as: Chester zoo, care UK and south essex college. The NCA argued that
between 2013-14, payments made to building contractors were intercepted and put through
multiple different bank accounts to make it harder to trace. This timeline, however, was
disputed in court. The NCA had made a number of mathematical and typographical mistakes
that were picked up on in court.The case, much to the defendants joy, collapsed completely.
It was apparent that the NCA had been terribly negligent in their investigations, rushing the
case and making a series of easily avoidable errors.
,Forensic pathologists
A Forensic pathologist's main role in criminal investigations is to perform the post mortem
exam and declare a cause of death as well as report any other contributions or findings.
They investigate any signs of abuse or sexual assault on a body as well as inner body
tissues. DNA evidence like blood splatter and hair samples as well as fingerprints are all
reviewed in the lab. Scientific evidence is often highly regarded by jurors and so it can be an
essential part of a conviction.
Strengths
Forensic Pathologists go through a lengthy medical degree followed by almost a decade of
in-field training before they get to call themselves a Pathologist. This makes them incredibly
skilled at what they do, allowing them to perform their duties with a minimal margin of error, it
also means that they are experts at what they do. Pathologists are also more than happy to
explain their findings on the stand, this allows the court to hear exactly what the evidence
produced means for the case and any possible criticisms can be shut down when needed.
Pathologists being experts in their field means that they understand the complications
cross-contamination can have and so they can take measures to prevent it giving more
validity and weight to the evidence they produce in cases where cross-contamination isn’t a
dispute. Pathologist’s findings aid police in their investigation and can help to rule out
suspects and point the police towards the actual offender.
Limitations
Pathologists main role is to aid the police with the backing of scientific evidence, however, it
can take time to test, analyse and produce results. This can lead to a major delay in
investigations and arrests as it can take up to 12 weeks to test certain forensic evidence.
Despite pathologists taking measures to avoid mistakes, all evidence produced is subject to
scrutiny in court meaning that it can be dismissed completely and the prosecution can be left
without scientific basis for their claims. Many people are put off by the long winded training
needed to be a pathologist, as well as this, being a pathologist is an extremely demanding
job and can mentally drain a person explaining the low number of pathologists available to
help a criminal investigation. There are a lot of government costs involved in pathology, the
average salary of a pathologist falls at £69,000 per year; it is also projected that a total of
£2-3 billion is spent on forensic science meaning that it leaves less government funding for
other areas. Like all humans, forensic experts make mistakes. Pathologists have been
criticised for their mistakes in past investigations and any mistakes made by pathologists can
lead to an offender being acquitted or not being caught at all.
Case study, Anthony Hardy
Anthony Hardy was a serial killer best known for dismembering his victims, giving him the
name ‘the camden ripper.’ Hardy first flashed up on the polices radar when he was accused
of vandalising his neighbours door, this led to a search of his house with allowed police to
discover the dead, beaten body of 38 year old sex worker, Sally white. Despite the bruises
and strangulation marks on her body, Pathologist on the case Freddy Patel, ruled her death
as a ‘natural occurrence,’ allowing Hardy to go free and kill again. Patel also made mistakes
whilst examining the evidence produced at Hardy’s crime scenes, delaying his arrest even
further. A report later found that Patel had been extremely negligent in his duties not just in
this case but in others in the past which he hid from his employers.
,Crime Scene Investigators
Crime Scene Investigators (CSI’s) are a popular role for hollywood movies and tv shows to
re-enact, usually to a highly dramatised, unrealistic extent. CSI’s are some of the first
personnel to a crime scene, this means that their first actions are highly important and any
mistakes in protocol can lead to some devastating effects to a case. Their main role is to
preserve the crime scene whilst reducing the risk of cross contamination so that any
evidence produced from the scene is reliable and has a lower chance of being disputed in
court.
Strengths
CSI’s are a vital part of criminal investigations, their actions to preserve a crime scene are
imperative to help the police catch their criminal. They take actions such as making all
people who enter a crime scene wear shoe coverings and protective body suits so that the
crime scene remains secure and any evidence found stays admissible. They operate via an
on-call system meaning they are always ready to assist on a crime scene. There is no
shortage of CSI's so they have a higher availability than some other investigative personnel.
Limitations
CSI’s have to follow protocol to the letter, if they don’t they risk the scene being
contaminated and the forensic basis of a case being deemed inadmissible meaning that the
prosecution will have little to no basis to back up their claims. There have been some major
budget cuts in the funding that CSI’s get, this leaves them with less protective gear and
increases the chances of cross contamination which will inevitably cause an increase in
miscarriages of justice, more guilty people will get acquitted by conversely, it could also see
more innocent people go down for crimes they did not commit. A decrease in funding of
CSI’s could also make the prosecution's case become frail, if they are unable to effectively
preserve a crime scene, it affects the quality of the evidence produced.
Case Study, Amanda Knox
Amanda Knox was an American national living and studying abroad in Italy. She was falsely
accused and charged with the murder of Meridith Kercher twice by the Italian government.
One of the biggest criticisms into this misscarriage of justice is the role the CSI’s played.
They failed to protect the crime scene and did not provide the police with protective
equipment leading to the cross contamination of the whole scene. Along with this, CSI’s
failed to preserve the physical evidence at the scene- this led to mixed DNA results after
evaluation. Despite all of the failings of the CSI’s in this case, it was all ignored by the italian
court and prosecution who managed to convict Knox not once but twice of a murder she
didn’t commit.
Police Officers
Police Officers are civil servants who are granted authority by the government in order to
protect the public from crime and offenders. Police officers are at the heart of law
enforcement, usually one of the first on the scene, they investigate leads, question those
close to the crime and produce a case for the CPS to use in court.
, Strengths
The police are civil servants who swear an oath to protect the public and to act in the best
interests of society, this means they are bound to act according to the law and to enforce it
in order to protect the public. The police are trained in how to handle crime meaning they are
effective at controlling a scene,calming down the victims and setting the tone so that
questions can be asked and the investigation can be launched in a positive manner. The
police aid in collecting the evidence at a crime scene and securing it to be processed and
analysed later.
Limitations
Police officers have been known to abuse their position of authority, mostly for personal
gain.This leads to a general mistrust amongst the public towards the police making people
less likely to report crime to the police. It can also lead to an increase in miscarriages of
justice, the police's actions are imperative as they set the tone for the investigation, the
misuse of power can lead to negligence during an investigation. Despite government cuts, it
is still extremely expensive to fund the police force, the annual budget is projected to be
around £15 billion, a huge amount of money for a government service. Some police officers
may adopt a zero tolerance policy towards crime, which has mixed results. It can be effective
in places with high levels of crime however it is purely ineffective in areas that lack crime.
Police are prone to implementing bias into their work, this can mean that some crimes like
hate crimes can go unlogged or uninvestigated making these protected groups less likely to
come to the police with their experiences. The police are not made to investigate every lead
and to log every piece of information they get about a crime; many times when the police
have been criticised for their handling of a case it is due to not investigating promising leads
or neglecting bits of information.
Case Study, Hillsborough
The Hillsborough tragedy saw the death of 96 liverpool fans during an FA cup final between
liverpool FC and Nottingham forest. Overcrowding in the stands led to human trampling
which saw many pushed up against the fences of the stadium leading to their death. The
stadium had more than filled its capacity before the police match commander ordered for
gate C to be opened leading to the 96 deaths and over 760 injuries. A story was spun by the
police force that it was the deviant behaviour and drunkenness of the Liverpool fans that led
to the tragedy that happened there, these lies were spread by newspapers, more namedly
the s*n. Fans were adamant that the fault should have been placed on the match wardens
and police however the first inquest into the death of the supporters ruled it as an
unfortunate accident, victims families and witnesses weren’t satisfied with this and pushed
for the case to be reopened. The second inquest proposed that the victims were unlawfully
killed due to gross negligence from the police and other emergency services who arrived on
scene, the inquest also showed that the design of the stadium itself was also a contributing
factor and that the fans themselves should not be blamed. The Hillsborough Independent
Panel was formed to review the evidence and supported the evidence presented in the
second inquest, it produced two criminal investigations- 6 people were charged with offences
including gross negligent manslaughter, misconduct in public office and preventing the
course of justice
The benefits of buying summaries with Stuvia:
Guaranteed quality through customer reviews
Stuvia customers have reviewed more than 700,000 summaries. This how you know that you are buying the best documents.
Quick and easy check-out
You can quickly pay through credit card or Stuvia-credit for the summaries. There is no membership needed.
Focus on what matters
Your fellow students write the study notes themselves, which is why the documents are always reliable and up-to-date. This ensures you quickly get to the core!
Frequently asked questions
What do I get when I buy this document?
You get a PDF, available immediately after your purchase. The purchased document is accessible anytime, anywhere and indefinitely through your profile.
Satisfaction guarantee: how does it work?
Our satisfaction guarantee ensures that you always find a study document that suits you well. You fill out a form, and our customer service team takes care of the rest.
Who am I buying these notes from?
Stuvia is a marketplace, so you are not buying this document from us, but from seller teiganbryant. Stuvia facilitates payment to the seller.
Will I be stuck with a subscription?
No, you only buy these notes for $16.84. You're not tied to anything after your purchase.
